Texas congressman threatens Obama with impeachment

A Republican congressman from Texas is threatening actions up to and including articles of impeachment against President Barack Obama if the 44th president uses executive powers to take any action toward curbing gun violence in the United States.

“I will seek to thwart this action by any means necessary, including but not limited to eliminating funding for implementation, defunding the White House or even filing articles of impeachment,” declared freshman U.S. Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Texas.

Candidate for impeachment? (Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP/GettyImages)

Stockman, who served one previous House term, was elected in November to fill the seat of GOP Rep. Ron Paul, who sought the Republican presidential nomination.

“The president’s actions are an existential threat to this nation,” Stockman added. “The right of the people to keep and bear arms is what has kept this nation free for 200 years. The very purpose of the Second Amendment is to stop the government from disallowing people the means to defend themselves against tyranny. Any proposal to abuse executive power and infringe upon rights must be repelled with the stiffest legislative force possible.”

Texas sends people like this to Congress.

Stockman was one of 15 House Republicans who refused to vote to re-elect House Speaker John Boehner. In his previous House stint (1995-97), Stockman wrote an article that accused the Clinton administration of raiding the Branch Davidian compound near Waco in order to justify a ban on assault weapons.

And, to borrow what Art Linkletter said about kids, Texas Republican congressmen say the darnedest things.

Then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay , out of the pest control business, likened Environmental Protection Agency inspectors to Gestapo agents. Rep. Joe Barton apologized to BP Chairman Tony Hayward at a hearing, accusing the Obama administration of a “shakedown” in persuading the oil giant to set up a fund to pay for damages from its catastrophic Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

The assassination of 20 first graders and six adults at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school has served as a call to arms for the Texas delegation. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, told a network Sunday talk show that Dawn Hochsprung, slain principal of Sandy Hook Elementary School, should have packed heat.

“I wish to God she had an M-4 in her office, locked up so when she heard gunfire she pulls it out — and takes his head off before he can kill these precious kids,” said Gohmert.

Steve Stockman was doubling down on Monday, as President Obama prepared to receive recommendations on curbing gun violence from a task force headed by Vice President Joe Biden.

“The president’s actions are not just an attack on the Constitution and a violation of his sworn oath of office, they are an attack on Americans that place all of us in danger,” he said.

The president hasn’t actually taken any action yet. He gets sworn in to a second term next month, having won reelection by a margin of nearly 5 million votes.